Xbox One pad small but improved

The Xbox One controller's design lead, Quintin Morris, has explained that the pad's small but significant improvements make the controller feel familiar but definitively better.

With Xbox Live's Social Marketing Manager, Graeme Boyd, prompting him to discuss how the Xbox One controller embodies tenets of precision, comfort and realism, Morris touched on various aspects of the pad's redesign.

A grip surface wraps around much of the controller's base, a shape which itself is said to be a more comfortable fit in the hand and one that allows for better thumb movement.

The ridged and textured thumbsticks sport concave tips held over from the Xbox 360, a feature absent from the PlayStation 3 pad but integrated into the PS4 equivalent.

There's a bit of Kinect functionality built in as well, as the Xbox One's motion sensor can track the controller's location around a room -- as long as it's not being hidden -- and therefore work out which player is holding it.

Precise, subtle vibration effects can be harvested from the controller's motorized additions, new rumble motors, as Boyd and Morris enthused about potential applications in shooting and driving games.

Leveraging the popularity of the Xbox 360's equivalent peripheral, and going some way to counter opinion that the PlayStation 4 is not only less expensive but also better designed for gaming applications, the video appeals to loyalists and to those wavering between the Xbox One and PS4.

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"When you pick it up, it doesn't feel like a different controller. It feels like a better controller," concluded Morris. "This was designed for gamers, by gamers."